Famous Poker Players Show That Poker Is A Game of Skill

• Author: Michael Mylar
• Filed under: Poker
• Date: Aug 13,2009

A study has been issued this year showing millions of hand in a statistical data from POkerstars which established the simple truth that – Poker is game of skill.

But a less technical proof has been displayed throughout the duration of the 2009 WSOP wherein the top notch players of the game have been winning in the tournaments and not only winning one but multiple tournaments in that matter.

An outstanding example of a multiple bracelet winner would be Jeff Lisandro – the new King of Stud. He triumph all the events in Stud poker in the WSOP counting Razz, 7-Card-Stud and 7 Card-Stud Hi/Lo.

That achievement is not an irregularity because there are others who have exceeded expectations as well. One would be Thang Luu who got the 2nd place during the$2500 Omaha 8 tournament in 2007, then won the $1500 Omaha 8 Tournament in 2008 and managed guard his title this year.

Seeing as the size of poker tournaments are getting larger each year it is rather unattainable for a poker player to win those events much less multiple ones if he or she has no edge over the entire participants.

And not to count the two players mentioned above, there are other who have managed the same feat they have:

Phil Ivey succeeds in getting his 6th and 7th bracelets. John Brock Parker won the 6-Max Limit and 6-Max No Limit Events. Another individual named Roland De Wolfe has managed to win the Triple Crown by winning a WSOP Event. He previously won the EPT and WPT events to complete the Triple Crown. Previous poker player Greg Mueller prevails in the $10k Limit Hold ‘Em tournament and the Limit Hold ‘Em shootout. 2 players have cashed in 7 events each in the WSOP and the would Daniel Negreanu and Barry Greenstein.

All this happened before the Main Event- the most sought after tournament in poker-take place. A poker professional who has won in the WSOP events has built a kindly reputation of their own.

The 2009 WSOP is the year of the professional poker players no matter what the Main Event results will be. As soon as the poker war started you can lift your chin and say “On any given day, anyone can win.”

But don’t be misled by the top lot. They are willing to take on an amateur in their table. Let them assume that he’s an ordinary poker player and I get them by surprised.

If someone has doubts in classifying poker then they need to look at the 2009 WSOP events to give them proofs that poker is extremely a game of skill.

Las Vegas Poker Superstar Stu Ungar

• Author: Ross Everett
• Filed under: Poker
• Date: Aug 11,2009

Stu Ungar didn’t have much going for him in most areas of life. In fact, it could very well be argued that he was downright inept in most areas of existence. He also had a self destructive streak that manifest itself in heavy drug use and other behaviors. Ungar, however, had one great gift–he was a prodigy with a deck of cards. He would become one of the first superstars of poker before it became a fixture on ESPN, but wouldn’t live to enjoy the ‘boom’. Ungar would eventually be done in by his baser elements, and would be found dead in a Las Vegas hotel room in November, 1988.

Ungar’s skills at the poker table were like Mozart’s at the piano. While countless volumes of poker strategy and theory have been written, Ungar’s understanding of the game was downright instinctive. Ungar’s greatest achievement was his three World Series of Poker victories, but he won millions in informal games and profitable card room sessions. The amazing thing about Ungar’s sheer mastery of Texas Hold’em was the fact that it was the third card game he had mastered. Ungar first came to Las Vegas as a gin rummy prodigy; he had beaten all of the good players on the East Coast and moved to the desert mecca in search of new opportunities. He had soon run the table of Nevada’s gin players, and then turned to blackjack out of necessity. He was quickly barred as a card counter at a number of Southern Nevada casinos. Needing a new vocation, he took up poker.

The cruel irony of Ungar’s life, however, was that masterful as he was at the poker table he was equally as inept at life beyond the casino walls. He was addicted to drugs for most of his life, and gambled away millions betting on sports and golf (a game he played despite being horrible at it). After his WSOP win in 1997, he was nearly broke and wasted away from drug use by the time the 1998 tournament rolled around. Vegas casino owner Bob Stupak bankrolled him, but as the games began Ungar cowered in his darkened hotel suite at Binion’s unable to pull himself together enough to play.

There are countless other Ungar stories that evoke the same theme: he once paid cash for a new Mercedes and drove it until it simply fell apart from lack of basic maintenance. He signed his mortgage paperwork at the table in the Dunes poker room and was taken aback that he couldn’t make his down payment in chips.

Ungar’s death came as something of a shock as he’d shown signs of cleaning up his act. Longtime friend Bob Stupak and helped pay off his debts and staked him in the major poker tournaments. Ungar was found dead two days after the two had drawn up a formal contract. Ungar also left behind an ex-wife and a teenage daughter, who still live in Las Vegas. Though the official cause of death was listed as a ‘heart attack’, there were a mixture of drugs found in his system including cocaine and methadone.

While many legendary gamblers have been tough, larger than life individuals with a healthy dose of ‘street smarts’, Ungar was the diametric opposite. He was almost completely helpless away from the poker table. In the card room, he became an almost unbeatable warrior. While his death came years before the ‘poker boom’, his influence as a pioneer of the game is without question.

The 2nd Poker Player Who Won The WSOP, WPT And EPT Tournaments – Roland De Wolfe

• Author: Enok Zimri
• Filed under: Poker
• Date: Aug 9,2009

The Triple Crown is garnered by a poker pro who won the three of the most important events in poker and that would be the European Poker Tour (EPT), World Poker Tour (WPT) and the World Series of Poker (WSOP). English professional poker player Roland De Wolfe is fortunate enough to become one of the two players who won the Triple Crown. He even dresses himself with a Union Jack track-suit during the $5,000 Pot Limit Omaha event where he won his first WSOP bracelet this year showing that his proud to be an Englishman.

The first poker pro who won the Triple Crown was Gavin Griffin. He won in $3,000 Pot Limit Hold ‘Em in 2004 to gain his WSOP bracelet; he gained the EPT Grand Final Title in 2007 and he won the WPT Borgata Classic in 2008.

De Wolfe got his first crown from winning the WPT Grand Prix De Paris in 2005; the second one from winning the EPT Dublin Title in 2006 and his last one from winning against 197 players including Griffin during the $5,000 PLO8 event at the WSOP 2009.

De Wolfe has been a writer in a poker magazine called the Edge and he confess that he knew a little about the poker variant that gave him his first bracelet. He said, “I’ve played PLO; and I’ve played limit Omaha 8; so, I just combined what I know about the two!”

Roland was already a known face at the European and American poker scene beginning on 2005 when he first made his first WSOP cash in an NLHE event. But do you also know that De Wolfe hugest win came not from the three events where he got his triple crown but from being 3rd in the $25,000 WPT Championship he participated in 2006? He got at least a million dollar from that event.

His win in the WSOP this year marks his first victory in the US territory even if he got good records from his preceding WSOP tournaments: 14 WSOP cashes and a total pay of $650,000 from the WSOP.

The two member club will soon increase its number due to the large number of participants playing in the EPT each year. Lots of American poker pros have been traveling in Europe in order to bag an EPT win in their pockets.

Maybe we’ll see an event in the future wherein the three crowning events will be augmented with the Aussie Millions or/and the Asia Pacific Poker Tour to build a Grand Slam one.